Fading, Like the Stars

When he finished speaking, I looked at Daniel for a moment. It seemed that it was my turn to say something, perhaps ask more questions, or find any other way to end the conversation. But, like always in important moments, there was nothing that came to mind. I couldn’t really say that I was surprised by anything he had told me, or that I didn’t believe him. But still… Still, it was a lot different, to hear bits of this whispered here and there, to think some of these things without daring to voice them out, and to hear Daniel tell everything as a proper story, with continuity between all these things and events. And now, I found myself once again with nothing to say, because although this was what I knew, it felt like an impossible thing to cope with, when you thought about it. Daniel had admitted so himself, there was not much anyone could do. It was suddenly much more obvious why people preferred to ignore the situation completely and tell themselves that at least they had a roof over their heads, and food in their plates. Realizing what the situation was really like, what the things that they had been deprived from were, that wouldn’t have brought any change, but it most certainly would have made their lives more uncomfortable. On the other hand, if no one even tried anything, then things were never going to change. But take the power by force, like Dan suggested was the only solution, that was a whole different thing. First, that implied a lot of weapons and a lot of violence used. Second, it required people who would be trained. Agreed, it might not be impossible to find these. But it wasn’t the guarantee to lead to the solution that he wanted. The third thing that bothered me was this: what would it make him, if he used of violence to get what he wanted? I’d always seen Dan as a very kind and gentle man, who would be willing to help anyone that would come to him for advice. To think of him as a fighter was, at best, a disturbing thought. But the part that disturbed me even more in all this was that there was a tiny part of me that, deep inside, simply wanted to nod in approval at everything he said. This was not how I usually reacted to things, and this was not how I wanted to react. I was more ‘run and hide’ than ‘stand up and fight’. The idea that I could be willing to use violence was even more disturbing than the thought that this was what Daniel wanted to do.

“Right,” I muttered, my head still full of thoughts that were not all pleasant things. “I… hum… yes, thank you, for sharing this with me…” I half stood up, already doubting what I was going to do. “I think I’ll leave you now.”

Daniel said nothing, but honestly, what could he have said that would have been more important than all the things that I had just heard.

“I’ll see you later today, right?” I muttered, completely standing up since Daniel was not trying to stop me with some last minute revelation. I took a few steps towards the door, and then stopped. If I had to be completely honest about it, this wasn’t exactly what I had expected to hear from Dan. Well, the story of how everything had happened was, but I had – I had sort of hoped that he would come with a solution, I mean, another solution than the one he had offered me. I’d thought that he would know of a way for us to make the whole thing better. It was that abandoned building, factory or palace or whatever, I think, that had made the difference for me. At some point in there, I’d started to see it as a metaphor of ourselves. We’d been glorious, we’d been full of beauty, and now we were shadows of what we’d been. It had struck me more than I had imagined it could. It wasn’t fair. From then on, I’d started to think. There should have been a way to restore some of that former glory. To give us a bit of the shine, or in this case the freedom, that we had lost. There should have been something that we could do.

Thing was, the solution that Daniel offered wasn’t what I had offered. I didn’t like it much, and I was sure that there were others around us who would like it even less.

“You speak of people who think like you,” I enquired nonetheless, turning away from the door to look at Dan again, “but do you know where they can be found?”

It took a long time before Dan answered. When he eventually did, it was very quietly. “No,” he said slowly, “not exactly. But even if I did, I wouldn’t tell you.”

“Why? Do you think I’d betray them? Do you think so low of me? Haven’t I proven that I can be trusted? I didn’t let you down, even when we had to come and hide here.”

Daniel smiled widely for the first time since we’d started this conversation. “Don’t get all defensive so quickly, it’ll get you in trouble someday. It has nothing to do with what you think, and if you’d let me finish what I was trying to say, you would know. What I was going to explain, before you stopped me, was that I’ve lost enough friends to this ghost of a cause. What good would it be to you, to know more about this? Just be happy with what you’ve got, it’s more than most people have. Besides, you’re by far not ready.”

“Isn’t all that for me to decide? It’s my decision, what I want. It’s up to me to decide whether or not I think I have enough with what I got.”

An annoyed wince flickered on Daniel’s face. “And that’s where you’re wrong, you know. Your decisions won’t just affect you anymore, that time’s done. You’re with us now, and whatever decision you take affects us. It’s not like before, Aimée, and I don’t think you’ve fully understood that yet. You can’t just go make your decisions carelessly because they only concern you. That time’s over. People here will be affected by all that you do now.”

I could see the logic behind his words, but it didn’t satisfy me fully. “Is that why you’re doing this then?” I questioned, though the grounds on which I was now venturing were far from safe. “Because it’s clear for anyone that hears you talk about it that you’re not satisfied. You want to fight, that much is clear to anyone who hears you talk about this. You’re convinced that this is the only way. And if there ever was a fight, I’m sure that you’d be in it. But you hardly ever talk about this, but why? I don’t understand. I mean, I really don’t. You’re so passionate about it when you speak.”

“I can do both. I can have ideas that are not those of the people surrounding me, and I can be mindful of their feelings, and of mine too. I can compromise with all that, because this is where I’m meant to be. It’s just being human, you know, to admit that you can’t always do everything that you would want to do. That I’m passionate about this cause doesn’t mean that I can’t also be passionate about my life in the circus, I can be passionate about my work with the tigers, about my feelings for Émilie, I can learn to be as passionate as Félix about the plays. I can be all that if I want to, and then sometimes one passion can be stronger and more important than another, and yet that doesn’t mean that I’m betraying myself or any kind of ideas or opinions that I might have.”

“Okay, I give up,” I answered with a sigh. “You’re probably right about it too. I just wished that there had been something that I could do. Whatever. It was stupid to ask in the first place. I don’t even know why I had this idea. We’re fine as we are, no?”

Daniel laughed lightly. “Well, I am anyway. Are you?”

“Uh, yes… Yes, I am…” I muttered, wondering how the conversation could have somehow turned out to this.

“Well then everything is good, isn’t it?” Daniel replied with a wide smile. “Come on now, now that we’ve sorted this out, tell me about outside. How is it? What did you see?”

His choice of words made me wince inwardly, because we hadn’t sorted anything out. Things were far from having been sorted out, and his answers honestly brought no me no relief. If anything, the questions were still there, and all that Daniel’s words had done was bring to light the fact that it was very unexpected for me to care about all of this, about the world and what had happened to it, and what could happen to it should things ever change. It was unexpected, and it was truly not the type of questions that would occupy my mind. And even stranger was the fact that I could not really tell why it had all of a sudden seemed so important to know about this. But best I could do, I figured out, was to ignore this. If I never thought about it again, I could return to seeing life like I saw it before, and just not care about the fate of all these other people that I didn’t know. I had cared only about my own life for a long time, and now I had learned to care about all these people that I had met thanks to the circus. As far as the caring went, that was enough of a progress as it was, for me. I could just stop there and be in peace with my conscience.

“The outside,” I murmured thoughtfully, as Daniel’s last words rang in my ears. “Well, it was…”

“The same as it was when we arrived?” Daniel offered when I failed to find the words to complete my own sentence.

I slowly shook my head, and after some hesitation, went to sit back in the seat that I had just vacated. “No, surprisingly not. It was – I felt it was different. I don’t know if it makes sense, but it was the same as when we had arrived, expect that it was even colder and that there was more snow, but it sort of felt different.”

“Felt different?” Daniel questioned, sparks of interest on his face as he leaned closer to listen more attentively to what I was saying, “What do you mean by that?”

“Well, I am not sure. But… You see, there was that building, that abandoned place that I – if I remember well, I described it to you when we arrived, as we saw it from afar.”

“I remember.”

“Well, we went to get a closer look at it. And that’s when it happened. I mean, I looked at it, as it was abandoned and derelict and I couldn’t figure out what it had been before, but I could see that it had been a beauty of a thing, and suddenly I felt the urge to know what had happened to this place, and if it was related to the history of the world, if it had been destroyed like all the things that are in the library would have been destroyed if they had found them.” I said all of this without taking a breath, and then looked at Daniel, amazed that I was telling him all this. Opening up to people wasn’t something that I was used to. I knew that it was something that they did often in the circus, talk about what they were feeling, but I had never been accustomed to it, not when I grew up, and certainly not after that, when I was alone.

“I see,” Dan said slowly, the attentive expression on his face briefly replaced by a look that was nothing but kindness, “hence the questions. I understand it better now. Go on, continue…”

“Actually, there is not much left to say,” I replied automatically, “we explored the building for a moment, and then, since it was so cold out there, we came back. That’s it.”

“You were out there for the best part of an hour,” Daniel replied softly, “and yet your account is very short.”

“Well, there is nothing to say, really. We went there, breathed fresh air, nearly froze to death, and then got back inside all fine.”

“All fine except…?”

“Except what?”

“You tell me.”

I sighed and shook my head. “Daniel,” I scolded him gently, “you’re often quite right when it comes to understanding people, but not always. And when you say that there’s something wrong, this time it’s you who are wrong about it. I assure you that everything is fine, and that I have nothing more to tell about that trip outside because there is honestly nothing more to tell about it. Now, you’ve got to excuse me for leaving you like this, but I’ll see you later at dinner, right?” I left immediately, before he had time to reply anything or come up with another imaginative theory.

I had no proper plan for the day ahead. Anything I could think of doing mostly revolved around hiding in a corner to give everything that Daniel had told me time enough to sink in, and so that I could have as much time to think about it as I wished. That idea, however, died as I was making my way to the room that I had been given, well decided to lock myself for an hour or two to have some peace, and that I found that Rufus was already waiting for me there. It surprised me to find him there, as I had not expected that he would be looking for me, and I didn’t think that there was anything really pressing that we had to talk about. Sure, I had been slightly annoyed that he wasn’t thinking that the abandoned building was as important as I thought it was, and that he did not care at all to find out what had happened to it, but that was gone already. It was impossible to be annoyed at Rufus for very long, and that thing was forgotten already. Now that I had all of Daniel’s revelations to think about, that little incident had left my mind. Besides, we had just spent an hour or so alone together, exploring the surroundings, so it wasn’t a pressing urge to see me that could have brought him there either. So, I was clueless as to why he was there.

“Rufus?” I was so not expecting him there that for a moment, it did not even seem real. “Why are you here? Is there anything wrong?” That there had to be something wrong, I didn’t know what, perhaps some news of the circus that weren’t that good, was the first thing that popped in my head, especially seeing the very serious look on his face.

“I don’t know,” he said softly. “Is there?”

“How could I know if… Oh,” suddenly it dawned on me that we weren’t talking about the same thing. What worried Rufus was in no way related to the circus. It concerned our life here. “You – you’re not talking about the circus, are you?”

He threw me a quick and puzzled look. “The circus? Why would I be… no, I’m not talking about the circus, I’ve had no news of them since we left…” He sighed, a sign that he didn’t really know how to say things. I could tell from the way he was speaking, and the way he was holding himself, that he was nervous. Rufus was not by nature a nervous kind of person. The only times I had ever seen him show signs of nervousness was when he couldn’t find the words to say precisely what was on his mind. “To be honest, I’m talking about you,” he said after a long and nervous silence. “I – you’ve been acting peculiarly since we went outside. I can’t figure out why, but …” I tried to protest, at that point. I knew what he was referring to, but it seemed ridiculous that he would have worried for so little, especially when there was nothing at all to actually worry about. Rufus lifted a hand to stop my protest before I could have formulated it clearly. “I’m not stupid,” he continued, “I can see perfectly that you’re annoyed at me. I could see you frown when I spoke, and I could almost hear you sigh whenever I moved. And I cannot, for the life of me, figure out why. I don’t know if it’s something I did or said that wasn’t fitting, or if it’s something else, because I cannot figure you out, sometimes. And I’m willing to apologize for whatever it was, but you’ve got to help me on this one, because I swear that I have no idea what’s wrong.” He finished his speech and took a deep breath, looking at me so intently that it made me flinch.

Finding the right answer to that wasn’t easy, because there was absolutely nothing wrong, apart from the fact that I had been momentarily annoyed, but it was without consequences. Except for Rufus, apparently.

“I – hum – there’s absolutely nothing wrong,” I struggled with the words for a moment. I could not tell him that there was nothing, because he hadn’t made it up, I had been annoyed. Only I had not expected that Rufus would notice, and I also had not expected that he would take it so seriously. It was something that passed. I had already forgotten about it, and I had expected that it was a closed subject. “I was lightly annoyed because you weren’t interested in the same things as me,” I muttered, sinking on the bed, absentmindedly playing with the blanket on it. “But it doesn’t matter.”

“It does matter,” Rufus corrected me, “when you’re angry at me and you don’t tell me why. Because I can’t guess it. And I can’t guess whether it’s important or not. And then I’m thinking that maybe you don’t want to be involved with me anymore. And if it is so, you have to say it, because you can’t just leave sulking and expect me to understand what on earth is going in your head. You can’t do things like that if you want this to work. It’s not okay. It’s not! You’ve got to be open about things, because I can’t guess what’s going on in your head, and when I do something wrong and I don’t know what it is, there’s nothing I can do to sort it out,” he said animatedly. It was the first time that Rufus was raising his voice against me. He wasn’t getting angry like he could get angry with Félix, but for the first time since I knew him, I could see that I’d struck something. There had been that time when we hadn’t talked to each other, just before we reached the capital, but this was different. We were almost sulking, then. This time it could potentially get worse.

Rufus’ words made me feel uneasy. It was logical, all that he said. Except that I wasn’t used to talking about my feelings so openly. And there was no need to get angry about this. Yet, despite the fact that I disagreed about his reaction, I couldn’t help feeling guilty because after all, it had not been my intention to make him worried or angry. I just hadn’t thought about his own feelings. I just hadn’t thought that my annoyance would cause him to have any kind of feeling

“You must excuse me on this,” I said in a small voice, looking at the ground. “And you must be patient, because I’m learning here. It’s not something that I’m used to, being with someone for a long time like this. I’ve been running from places to places for a long time now, it’s been long since I paused to get attached to someone, or actually, let myself feel anything, for that matter. So, I’m sorry. Like I said, I’m learning here. And hum… well, I cannot immediately think of what I must do for others. I didn’t think for one second that you might be hurt or worried, but I won’t do it again, now. See, learning.”

“Yeah. ‘s alright. If you say we’re fine…”

I nodded, casting away all thoughts about history and revolution for the time being. “Sure. Could you – could you give me a minute? I need to sort a few things out… with myself. Then I’m all yours.”

Rufus smiled widely. “A tempting offer that I can’t refuse. I’ll wait for you outside.”